"As far as I'm concerned, if the check clears, it's all yours."
"It's all ours," grinned Lorelai.
Sookie was beaming. "It's all ours."
One look from Miss Patty stopped the jumping, and they shuffled a few steps off to the side, fake coughing with embarrassment.
"This is happening, right?" Lorelai asked. "It's actually happening? I don't want to just wake up in the shower and -"
"It's happening. It's finally happening for us, Lorelai. You and Me. Me and you, and I … I'm going to faint," Lorelai steadied Sookie at the elbow. "No, nope. I'm good, I'm good. Are you -? Are we -?"
"Go make jam."
"Jam?" Her face scrunched in the question, then suddenly opened. "Oh my god, jam!"
"I have to get back to the Inn," said Lorelai, gripping her bag at her shoulder, "but how about a little celebrating later?"
"And we'll toast Fran!"
Old Man Philips, stooped and clasping both elbows behind his back, shook his head sadly at her as he went by.
After her shift at the Independence Inn, Lorelai heeled the front door shut and lifted her voice to reach wherever Rory might be, "So, I know you didn't want to be - -Hey," before finding her at her desk with the door open.
"Hey." A finger marked the word on the textbook page where she looked up, while Lorelai rested her temple on the door jamb as she leaned against the frame.
"Studying?"
"I can take a break," Rory said, setting down her pen to turn in her chair.
"Okay, so I know you didn't want to be a part of that because ... well, I guess for a start you're not a terrible person, but -"
"Do I have that in writing anywhere? Because I've been wondering lately."
"Yeah, should be around the place somewhere," Lorelai said, making a show of casting around the room. "I'll help you look. Anyway, I realize you obviously bailed on the whole procession-through-the-square thing when you saw me … you know. Because, god knows, all signs were pointing to the hellmouth opening for real right beneath my feet, and I'd deserve it -"
"Actually, I was in the diner for a bit," Rory broke in, "and then, when you and Sookie took off at four minute mile pace, I thought the risk of multiple fatal lightning strikes was probably a little less, so I snuck onto the end."
"So you saw -"
"Yep."
"Oh. What about -"
"That too. And that wasp was meant for you, I'm pretty sure."
"Poor Kirk."
"Poor Kirk," Rory echoed.
"But listen," Lorelai re-began, "I get that we're not officially at the peace treaty signing stage of this thing yet, but can we call, like, a truce or something just for-"
"Yes."
"Okay, great," Lorelai said, sitting down on Rory's bed, "Because I have news I've been sitting on for a whole 5 hours now, and you have no idea how nuts that is making me, except I'll say this: something tells me I'm about to find out what it's like to actually, physically plotz."
"Then you better go ahead, because there's no way I want to see that."
Lorelai cocked her head, brow furrowed, the dumbshow of thoughtfulness completed by crooking her forefinger ostentiously behind her bottom teeth. "Do you have to say 'Truce' or anything? To ratify this before we -?"
"Truce, okay?" Rory forestalled. "And for the record, if you plotz I am not cleaning it up."
"That's ... wow," said Rory after her mother finished her news.
"It is wow."
"Just ... I mean, wow."
"I might even up the ante to wowser."
Rory nodded. "Wowser's good. I like wowser."
"Because who doesn't like a good wowser now and then, right? You don't hear it enough, I think. It's one of those words for all occasions, like supercalifragilisticexpialidocious. But, you know," Lorelai shrugged, "shorter."
"So, say your ex-boyfriend comes up to you," Rory mused, "and he says 'I'm getting married' or something. You can just drop the 'ole 'Wowser' and hey presto, everything's great. That kind of thing?"
"Sounds perfect to me. Then you say congratulations and give me back my Blondie albums."
"And if he did it at a funeral?"
"Well, in that case, you ... wait, what?"
"So how were things chez Fancypants Mansion last night?"
She asked because "a muffin, Lorelai" was still echoing in her head from five hours before.
The seventeen green Post-Its Michel handed her when she arrived back after the funeral did not bode well. Emily's designated color never did. The volume of the notes, Michel's silent arm's-length handoff: none of this was good.
"Were you in some kind of accident, Lorelai? Or maybe a bank job gone awry? No, let me guess, a circus train was -"
"A funeral, Mom. I was at a funeral."
"Really, Lorelai, it's in very bad taste, even for you, to lie about -"
"Seriously, Mom? You think that badly of me that - -Nope, not going there right now."
Her chest rose and fell to the rhythm of her mental And Breathe.
"Me and Rory went to a funeral today, Mom," she said with once upon a time lightness. "The funeral of a great old lady who gave Rory cookies before she had teeth. And she was that kind of old-lady-nice to us ever since for, oh, about sixteen years - -But you know all of this because I'm pretty sure Rory told you when she left, so unless you think your granddaughter is a big fat liar like her mother, why don't you just tell me what your super-urgent can't-wait deal is and -"
"For your information, Lorelai, Rory said nothing of the kind. She simply said she had to study for her finals and promised to spend another evening with me and her grandfather before you two set off for Europe. She was very sweet about it."
"Oh."
"Quite."
"Well, maybe -"
"And though I have no idea why she didn't feel comfortable confiding in me, it is, of course, Rory's prerogative, and I have no reason to feel upset."
"Mom -"
"It might, however, go some way to explain how she seemed. Presuming, that is, that you dropped this little bombshell on her when you called last night?"
"I, yes, we -"
"As I suspected."
It wouldn't be a real smile, Lorelai knew, but the contained movement of Emily's mouth appeared vividly in her mind. The Germans probably had a word for not-quite-Schadenfreude, right?
"... extraordinary lack of tact." She realized her mother was speaking again. "I sent her to bed, you know."
"Why? Did she curse? Rory can work a little blue every now and -"
"Not that she slept," Emily forged ahead. "The sheets were pleated like a cheap skirt, and -"
"Mom, ew, please. Tell me you didn't actually -?"
"She is pale, Lorelai," said Emily, with needlepoint emphasis. "Don't tell me you haven't noticed?"
"Rory is pale, Mom. So am I, and so are you. We've got the pale and interesting bit going for us, genetically. And wouldn't you rather that for her than Dad's whole corned-beefy thing -"
"Lorelai, her appetite was abominable. She barely touched her dinner, and I'd had Greta make that … that popcorn chicken you two raved about not too long ago."
"Maybe popcorn chicken isn't Greta's forte, Mom. It's probably not something a human in a kitchen is capable of making. Robots are involved, I bet. Conveyor belts and giant pointed doohickies that smoosh the - -Honestly, I really don't want to think about it."
"That's all very well but a muffin? She ate a muffin, Lorelai."
"Huh, no kidding. Rory ate a muffin. I'll alert the -"
"The girl who eats her weight in prime rib at dinner less than a month ago, this morning barely picks at a blueberry muffin? That causes you no concern at all?"
"So, Greta's muffin's suck too? Sounds like she's not too hot on the old cooking front, there, Mom."
"Are you two fighting?" whipped from the end of Emily's tongue.
"Who, me and Greta?" Lorelai recovered. "I guess I'm being a little hard on her, sure, but we've never met so -"
"So you're not fighting?"
Lorelai sighed. "Mom, Rory seemed about as fine as anyone can at a funeral just now, okay? I appreciate your concern, but me and Rory -"
"Oh, of course, I forgot you and Rory have the perfect relationship that I am simply incapable of understanding, isn't that right? Her own grandmother is interfering when she attempts to -"
"No, Mom," she said, pinching the bridge of her nose like she could squeeze the incipient migraine out of existence, "you're entitled to raise any worries about Rory that you have. I just -" Lorelai breathed deeply again. Emily's interruption stayed bated. "It's fine. Please," she said, "go on. Did you … was there anything else? About Rory, I mean. That you noticed."
There was a pause, and Lorelai strained her imagination picturing her mother's face.
"I …" Emily hadn't prepared for that. "Actually, yes. At first I put it down to that school of hers. She works so hard - -And all her commitments, I was wondering if she's taken on too much. But," there wasn't an opening for Lorelai's response, "of course your father says -"
"Emily, where are my cufflinks, right?" said Lorelai in faux baritone. "I bet Dad says that all the time."
"Lorelai, please."
"Yeah, that's another good one, isn't it? Usually he follows that up with -"
"Will you please be serious?"
"Okay Mom, but you've got to work on your delivery or you've got no hope in the business we call show."
"If you're not interested, Lorelai, you could spare us both the trouble and just hang up. I'm not in the habit of -"
"Go on, Mom, I'll stop, promise."
"I mean it, if you can't - even for five minutes - stop with your -"
"Mom, girl scout's honor, seriously."
Emily's high shoulders dropped. "I know you won't thank me for this but - -Oh, I don't care. Is it boy trouble?"
"Well, Mom, there is a boy, and he is trouble. But I don't think -"
"Surely she's not still seeing that arrogant brawler, whatsit - -Jack or ..."
"Jess, and yes. Him. She's worried about him, I think. The kid … he's -"
"Awful, unsuitable, a rough," came the litany. "Why, Lorelai? Why are you -?"
"Mom, hold on, I don't -
"... irresponsible and …"
"Mom, seriously, can we press pause on the tirade for a sec? Take a breath, okay?"
Lorelai did. Emily must have had to. The course of the conversation had maneuvered Lorelai to the farthest end of the check-in desk, where she was staring down the wallpaper.
"Okay," she resumed, having sufficiently steeled herself to say, "You're right, Mom."
Like the last time, it felt more than odd. Still, the element of surprise might just work to shut this down, so she carried on.
"Rory is stretched pretty thin these days. School, the paper, the vice-president thing she does. All that stuff. And yeah, I'm not overjoyed that her boyfriend's a smart-mouthed little punk who got in a fight the other night, but -"
"See! He's a hooligan. I can't understand -"
"But," Lorelai increased her volume to seize back the initiative like she'd never ceded it, "The only reason I know? Because Rory told me."
Unmistakably, it was Michel's cough - to her ear, always very French - loud and making her look round. Not for the first time since she made the call. Only, it was the first time she noticed. At that moment he was conspicuously intent on marking something in the big orange ledger.
Lorelai lowered into an emphatic whisper, "She came to me and told me. And it's obvious she's worried about him for, oh, about a million reasons probably. She's a good kid, Mom, you know this. So I trust her. She knows she can tell me anything."
I hope.
"And that's all I can do. So whether it's school, or Fran, or something with Jess, in her own time she'll - -Actually, her best friend has a thing going on right now too, maybe that's -"
Michel was gesticulating at her as only he can: a phone, a slit throat, a pair of scissors.
"But I've got to go, Mom. I've been at the funeral and all, and work needs me, so -"
"Lorelai!"
"Bye."
Not that she told Rory a word of it.
"Oubliette, huh?" said Lorelai, still perched on the edge of Rory's bed, listening to her talk about Saturday night with Emily, "Why am I picturing David Bowie in tights?"
Rory mustered "Um …"
"And it's not even Tuesday," Lorelai went on, tapping her lip, "but I'm getting a very strong - - Hoggle! That's why."
"Aw, Hoggle," cooed Rory. "Oh, thanks a lot, now all I can think of is how much I want the book Jennifer Connelly was reading. Man, imaginary books bug me so much. Tell me, how is it fair to invent a book I can't read? It's what they're for!"
"Uh oh, I sense a rant about the Neverending Story coming."
"Oh, don't get me started on books within books that you're reading, but the protagonist is also reading, but then it doesn't even - -Just don't."
"I wanted the dress," Lorelai said wistfully, cheek on her fist.
"At the beginning or the end?"
"Beginning. You know, I loved that she had jeans underneath, so she could hitch it up and run in the rain. I always thought that was cool."
"It is cool," Rory nodded. "Except wet denim is gross."
"And running. Running's gross."
"Really gross."
"Well, I guess that clears my diary Thursday. And actually, now I think about it, the one at the end is eerily like something my mother shoehorned me into to meet Gran one time when I was fifteen." Lorelai's shoulders twitched in a shiver. "Itchy. And cold."
"Like wet denim," said Rory, grimacing.
"Ick."
"So, you're saying I got off lightly with the whole debutante thing?"
"Very. But just wait, she'll get that tiara on your head one of these days. Or, if you're lucky like yours truly, stuck in your scalp." She rubbed at a spot on her crown, wrinkling her nose.
"Ouch."
"Yup." There was slow, sage nodding. Until the handbrake, "Anyway, you got to watch our little improv bit from the comfort of Luke's?"
"It's a two drink minimum." Not straight-faced, but incongruously cherubic.
"Martinis, Ms Parker?"
"Whisky sours," said Rory, matter-of-fact.
"Well, duh, if you're at a diner, of course. How's Jess?"
Rory's heart leapt, but not pleasantly. Already slouched sociably forward in the upright chair, her hands above her knees slipped further inwards, wrist-back to wrist-back, as she curled more perceptibly.
"Okay, I think." She noticed her elbows turning outwards, weirdly.
"Nothing broken?"
"Nope," she said lightly, and made herself look up. "I don't think so."
"Good."
"Yep," Rory said, lifting her mouth into a smile. "Good."
"But you're still worried about him, right?"
"I … yes," was the only thing she could say. It was the truth after all, if not all of it. "But -"
It was the kiss that did it.
"Rory, it's okay," Lorelai cut her off. "I'm not prying about his stuff, or the stuff he has with Luke, or Dean, or … whoever the people are with the Hummels. But you're my kid, and that means when your face says 'I'm worried', I worry."
"I know you do."
Because the teeth-on-edge rasp of her key on both their buckles had only made her say his name and 'window.' So it was the kiss and not the key.
"Look," Lorelai said, her long forearm turning over on her thigh as she reached an inch towards Rory, "I know you care about him, and you want to take his world on your shoulders like you do everyone's - -Polar bears, the entire continent of Africa, Paris," she listed off her fingers. "But you can't let just more and more weigh you down, kid."
"I know."
And not what he said either, she was pretty sure. That he loved her. Sure, it was a factor, but that kiss ...
"Lane too, even. I can see it, you're not sleeping or - -Cookies! We need cookies, right? Let's go to Doose's and -"
"Lane." Rory straightened in her chair, her mouth opening as her jaw slowly fell.
"I know, I wonder how she's -"
Rory bolted up, "I have to go."
"What?"
"I can't believe - -What is the matter with me? I'm -"
Lorelai got up and put her hands on Rory's shoulders to stop her in the middle of some kind of search that involved flipping over a pile of textbooks one by one.
"Rory, slow down."
"I can't," Rory said, twisting away back to her desk. "I have to -"
"What are you looking for? Let me help. You just have to stop and tell me what's going on, okay? You're scaring the Mommy."
Rory wheeled around. "Was she there today? At the funeral, was she there?"
"Lane? Yeah, she was. She looked round for you, but you were -"
"Late, I know. I can't believe I didn't even look for her. Am I friend-blind or something? I'm so wrapped up in all this … this stuff that - -See? I said I was a terrible person, and this is proof."
"Rory, you're being too hard on yourself. She was at least three rows in front, and you know Mrs Simmons always wears that big hat to funerals. You didn't stand a -"
"No, I'm not. I'm really, really not. On Saturday? I meant to see her at the church, but I bumped into Jess, and then I had the paper, and Paris, and - -And I forgot. There. I said it. I forgot my best friend."
"Rory -"
"My best friend barfs up all her secrets - life-changing secrets, probably-going-to-be-shipped-off-to-Korea secrets - and what do I do? Nothing, that's what. She could've been gone already. Or by now, at least. I might never see her again."
She ground the heel of her hand into one side of her forehead. "God, I never realized I was so horrible, so self-absorbed, I'm such a -"
"Whoa there, kid, whatever you think you are, you're not."
"I am." Rory turned back again, scrabbling for keys, wallet, and cramming them into her jeans' pockets. "I didn't even look for her. What if she tried to catch my eye when she left? She'll think I blanked her. Blanked by her best friend when - -God, I have literally no idea what's happening with her. I swear, if Mrs Kim has … has, I don't even know, but I'll -"
"Rory, come on, I bet it's not as bad as you think. They probably just had the mother of all fights and now they're trying to …" Lorelai paused to choose the word, as if she could imagine how that relationship worked, "... to come to an understanding or something. I mean, think about it: it must have been awful for Mrs Kim to find out all that, you know? Lane's always managed her Clark Kent bit so well, it's got to -"
"Wait," Rory turned, looking stunned. "Awful? More awful than being kicked out? Or sent away god knows where? Than having to lie like that about … about everything? You're taking her side?"
"No, I'm just saying - -Look, maybe it's a mom thing, but all I'm saying is, I can imagine how much it must hurt her. To realize you didn't know your own kid or -"
"Oh sure," Rory's arm flew out with sarcasm, "Because she's always made it so easy to be honest, right?"
"No, but -"
"But? Seriously, you have a 'but'?!"
"Rory -" Shocked by that vehemence. So much in so few days.
Rory was too.
"She doesn't know Lane?" Rory went on. "She doesn't want to know the real Lane. You think she'd be such a world class liar if she didn't have to be? Trust works both ways, Mom. And, yes, I know I sound like Dr Phil, so don't even bother."
"I wasn't -"
"Lane is so … so hemmed in on all sides that, yeah, she went a little crazy. Who wouldn't?"
"You realize you just described my life, my mother, don't you?" Lorelai jabbed her own sternum, hard. "You're saying all this like I don't think Mrs Kim's entire way of raising Lane is wrong. Of course she should give Lane freedom, should trust her to make her own decisions. In what universe do I not think those things?"
"Okay, so you've got cognitive dissonance nailed, congratulations. I have to go."
Lorelai followed her daughter out into the corridor, getting louder as Rory rounded the corner into the hallway.
"Look, if this is about me going to Luke about Jess, then you're still wrong, kid. I'm sorry, but you are."
"Message received," Rory said, pulling the door shut behind her without looking back.
Rory reached the Kim house with a random textbook under her arm and a speech rehearsed that she hoped she'd get to use.
"Hi, I -"
"Lane is grounded. Goodbye."
"Mrs Kim, wait. Lane needs this book I borrowed, so -" holding it up to the fast closing gap in the door, "Would you -"
She took it. Shook it. "If there is a note in here, I will find it. And Lane will be in more trouble."
"No note, I promise."
"We'll see."
Clang.
Glad she'd thought better of the note idea. But she dare not try the pebble-thing in daylight - stupid daylight savings, stupid equinox, stupid sun not even set - but maybe later tonight. Unless that was stupid. Reckless. Putting Lane in more jeopardy, just to soothe her own conscience. So what then? What could she -
At least Lane would know she was thinking about her.
Rory had with her only whatever assorted study materials that were left in the backpack she'd grabbed on her way out, but she started out for the library anyway.
Her stomach shrank, and she told herself it was hunger.
"Hey."
Jess looked up from his book, propped on one elbow by the register.
The wake had soaked up all the regulars, and Jess's welcome didn't keep the antiquers, single or paired, hanging around for extra pie and barbs. The place was empty.
"Hey. Someone else die I should know about?
"What?" said Rory, too preoccupied to realize how preoccupied she looked.
"Nothing. So what's up?"
"Jess," Luke's voice, then his suit came through the curtain seemingly about four seconds before him, so unusual was the sight. "Have you seen my - -Oh, hey Rory."
"Hey Luke."
"This is why," said Luke, and pointed at Rory. Remind me again, Jess had asked, why I'm keeping this place open?
"Seen your what?" said Jess.
"My what?" Luke said, finger in his collar at his Adam's Apple. The throwback too flat for him to catch. "Oh, my, uh - -Doesn't matter."
It was awkward.
"So." Luke started and stopped. Thumbed redundantly at the door. "I'm heading out. To the wake."
"And?" said Jess, before Luke could add another pointless, halting clarification. ("For a while." "I'll be back. Later.")
"So … I don't know," he shrugged. "Don't leave, don't set anything on fire, don't let Kirk … anything. And lock up. Which means -"
"Jeez, I know what 'lock up' means. And your tie's in your pocket."
"My …? Oh." It was. "Right." Luke said, looking at it like it was a grenade.
Jess rolled his eyes.
"Okay then," Luke said, then gave a stiff eighth of a wave to Rory before his fingers snatched into the palm like he thought better of it. Directed the nod at Jess.
Rory returned the wave, augmented into something natural-looking. The force of Jess's second eyeroll had apparently turned him round to the coffee machine before the bell sounded.
"Cesar's gone too," he said as he poured unasked, "Meaning I got baked potatoes, peach pie, and two bran muffins, so you're out of luck if you wanted, like, actual food."
"It's okay. I'm not hungry."
"Huh. I'd mock you for lying right to my face, but I'm guessing now's not the time."
"Correct."
"Noted."
She had finished the sip, but still wasn't talking.
"So-oo," he protracted, coming round from behind the counter to sit on the stool he hauled closer to hers, "I'm going to ask you 'what's up?' again. Despite rumors of that death stare."
That conjured its opposite. "Tough guy, huh?"
He waved it away. "More rumors."
"This town," she said shaking her head, only some of the weariness put on.
"You're gonna make me ask a third time, aren't you?"
"No, not-so-tough guy. I talked to my mom."
His eyebrows went up so he didn't have to say it. Didn't have to pick from the so many its it could be. Us? Me? It.
"Not about that," she said.
"Okay."
"I can't."
"Okay."
The echo as even as the original, like it didn't matter, but in a good way. Whatever's negative image. Maybe, about anything else, she might have believed it really could be. But nothing was okay.
She didn't know it, but only Rory got the genuine article of that look. I'm listening.
Teachers, bellyaching erstwhile colleagues, gossipy Hollowers: they saw either the vacant sign or the snarl that said stop talking. Luke more often got the pastiche. I'm hanging on your every word.
"It's like every time I think, okay, maybe now, she goes and says something that just … she's just - -I can't."
He bit his lip and nodded. Not because there were no words. He had words. Could have said I get that this matters to you. You wouldn't be killing yourself over it otherwise, right? But don't talk like you need to justify yourself to me.
In fact, what was on the tip of his tongue was I could care less if your Mom -
But he knew to bite it back. And not just because it was obvious nothing he said could drag her out of the hole she felt like she was in. She pushed her mug an inch further away by the handle and sighed.
"And the worst part is I know she's right. She's right about Mrs Kim even if Mrs Kim is wrong, and she was right to talk to Luke even though I asked her not to, I know that. I know it, and I hate it. I hate that she broke her promise - except she didn't even promise, so that's okay, apparently."
"Oh," she said, "but wait," failing at cool and sardonic with the wounded speed of so many about-faces, "It's not. It's not okay, it sucks. Because faking out at promising is a sucky thing to do, but hey, who cares, she has the moral high ground, and I … I just -"
You could see where the ceiling fell in the day of the umbrella. But probably only if you knew. Unless you rip the whole thing out, something like that was impossible to cover, Tom had said.
"Hey, stop. Don't -"
She wasn't crying, but the breathing tipped him off even before the con of looking up. Pushing his fingers between hers where they lay on the counter-top didn't stop it, but it did make her turn her hand over into his. Made her look at him again after she'd dragged the tear away into the hair above her ear.
"I'm so mad at her for making this so hard, you know?"
He nodded.
"Still," she sent air down her nose in something just about recognizable as a laugh, "the person I'm most mad at for messing this whole thing up is here in the diner, and no, she isn't you," she said to the newly raised eyebrows.
"Huh."
"God, and then there's Lane. I can't believe -"
She was mad at Lane?
"I hadn't even thought about Lane's thing with Mrs Kim, and she could've been shipped off by now, and I would've done exactly nothing to stop it! I'm a horrible, horrible friend, I -"
"Has she?"
"No, but that doesn't change what I did. I forgot that Lane blew up her life because I'm too busy thinking about myself. About all this … this stuff. You," she said, starting a list, adding quickly, "No offence -"
"None taken."
"The fight with Mom - -No, fights. Plural, which, just - -Ugh."
"And the bakery lady died, and you got shanghaied by your grandparents," he added to her list. "Paris." Because she was her own category of drama. Dean sounded in his head but he gritted his teeth on it.
"None of these are excuses," she said, her index finger hammering the counter. "I'm awful. The end."
"Nope," he said.
"What do you mean, 'nope,' I just told you all the -"
"Look, I'm not going to argue with you, but," he shrugged. "You're not."
"How about we agree to disagree?"
"Nope."
"Jess." Code for exasperating.
"Counter-proposal?"
"Go on."
That kiss. Always the kiss that did it.
The note on the phone table said I trust you to call me at Sookie's when you get home.
Palimpsest, Rory thought as she dialed, until Sookie deafened her by yelling, "Rory, hi! Lorelai, it's Rory! Rory, do you wanna speak to -?" and she heard her mother cut in.
"It's okay, I trust you it's her, Sookie."
"She says -"
"And I trust that she ate dinner."
"Oh-kay," said Sookie. "Um -"
Lorelai carried on, "Tell her I'll be back later, but I trust her to get some sleep and not study all night."
"Rory, do you hear -?"
"It's okay, Sookie. Congratulations on getting the Dragonfly."
"Thanks, sweetie. So you're not coming over to -"
"I can't, I have finals coming up, so ..."
"Ack, exams, am I right? Well, good luck."
"Night, Sookie."
The pink ink I'm sorry was in the trash.
He hadn't checked out of the motel, even though all the brown was giving him a horror movie vibe. The town itself was more second season Twilight Zone.
So when he finished the book and had read every word of the advertisements for Books By This Author - having read the books themselves about eight times, give or take, in the preceding thirty seven years - and the four pages of Publisher's Catalog with their corresponding pencil check marks, he didn't start one of the other three he brought with him. Or the two he bought in the pokey bookshop.
He didn't pack.
He got off the bed and headed back to Luke's. And for sixteen minutes he watched the empty diner from the stalls outside the market while doing his best impression of Guy About to Buy a Watermelon - maybe a grapefruit, the grapefruits looked good - because the place is deserted but the sign still says Open. Was is Serve Yourself night or something? Was that a thing? Maybe just a thing they had here.
Then the girl appeared from somewhere inside and came to the door - same girl, different jacket - and the boy showed her out. Grapefruits, definitely. Or oranges. Oranges were okay. Because this was weird, watching them dance around it like that at the door.
Jeez, come on, still?
But at least that meant no Luke, which was good. So he could do this. Could go over there and say something, and maybe it would go okay. With the boy. He could. At least, if they would just stop with the long goodbye already. Teenagers.
No stomach to do the thing with Luke. That could wait. Talking to the boy was what to do right now. The right thing.
Christ, his son. A teenager. Eighteen in, what, two days?
Man.
A/N Thanks for reading. If you have a sec to review, I'd appreciate it.